In 1785 C.E., the French occultist Eteilla (Jean-Baptiste Alliette) became the first professional tarot diviner. He popularized the use of the tarot as a divinatory tool to a wide audience, and was the first to develop and publish a set of correspondences, linking the cards to astrology, the four classical elements (earth, fire, water, air), and the four humors (black bile, yellow bile, blood, and phlegm). These correspondences are still useful today.

The word tarot and German Tarock derive from the Italian tarocchi, the origin of which is uncertain but taroch was used as a synonym for foolishness in the late 15th and early 16th centuries.[2][3] The decks were known exclusively as trionfi during the fifteenth century. The new name first appeared in Brescia around 1502 as tarocho.[4] During the 16th century, a new game played with a standard deck but sharing a very similar name (trionfa) was quickly becoming popular. This coincided with the older game being renamed tarocchi.[1] In modern Italian, the singular term is tarocco, which, as a noun, means a type of blood orange, and, as an adjective, means 'fake, counterfeit'.
No, it really doesn’t work like that. Just like us, spirits have free will — mediums don’t have power over them. Most of the time, you’ll hear from the ones you’re hoping will come through with a message for you, but it’s rare that a medium will guarantee who’s going to come through. I’ve done many a reading with people who want to connect with a specific person, but end up hearing from someone they never expected. It isn’t a case of 1-800-Dial-the-Dead! Just such a situation happened recently when I sat with a client named Vivian who had great trouble walking, so I agreed to go to her home.
You may find it helpful know that what you are experiencing is fairly common, and you aren't alone. Lots of people from all over the political, religious, age, class, race, industry spectrum have pulled me aside to talk about this. (So relax, alright?) It's just something no one wants to discuss because they're afraid everyone will think they're crazy. It's a terrible isolation loop, really. But moving on . . .
In English-speaking countries, where these games are not played, tarot cards are used primarily for divinatory purposes, usually using specially designed packs.[1] The cards are traced by some occult writers to ancient Egypt or the Kabbalah but there is no documented evidence of such origins or of the usage of tarot for divination before the 18th century.[1]
If I had to choose one book to take to a desert island, this would be it. The ageless "Song of God" is, of course, a magnificent, sacred scripture and not technically a novel, but its narrative form makes it read like one. The Gita tells the story of Arjuna, who turns to the God Krishna, his friend, for explanations and advice on life. Krishna lays out an entire worldview, the philosophy of Vedanta, one of the great achievements of human thought. Christopher Isherwood, an English novelist, and Swami Prabhavananda, a disciple of Sri Ramakrishna and Isherwood's guru, translate the Gita in a simple, modern style, alternating between prose and poetry without sacrificing the majesty and wisdom of this ancient story. Krishna gives Arjuna simple advice which I have found so useful in my own life, such as not to do anything for results, but rather for God: "You can have the work," he tells Arjuna, "but not the products of the work."
According to the magician John Booth the stage mentalist David Devant managed to fool a number of people into believing he had genuine psychic ability who did not realize that his feats were magic tricks. At St. George's Hall, London he performed a fake "clairvoyant" act where he would read a message sealed inside an envelope. The spiritualist Oliver Lodge who was present in the audience was duped by the trick and claimed that Devant had used psychic powers. In 1936 Devant in his book Secrets of My Magic revealed the trick method he had used.[159]
All of Kerouac's work constitutes a dialogue between his Buddhist and Hindu learning and the residues of his Catholic upbringing. This autobiographical novel, his most joyous and optimistic work, centers on his meeting and friendship with Gary Snyder (here called "Japhy Ryder"), the American poet and student of Chinese and Japanese culture and Zen Buddhism. Kerouac, the child of immigrants and raised in a Massachusetts mill town, is guided by Gary Snyder, Oregon mountain man and anthropologist, in treks up mountains toward "heaven," and in his first steps toward an ecological view and a path of personal independence. Kerouac, in turn, becomes our guide to the spiritual possibilities inherent in the grandeur and beauty of the great American Northwest. As Kerouac and Snyder trade Buddhist one-liners and bring Eastern thought into contact with native American influences like Walt Whitman, Henry David Thoreau, and John Muir, we realize we are witnessing a rebirth of American transcendentalism. The book is filled with a youthful energy and idealism that makes you wish you were there with them during a time when anything seemed possible for young Americans and for the American novel. See also5 Must-Read Summer Books
This free six-step study guide will help you learn the basics of Tarot reading, and give you a good start on your way to becoming an accomplished reader. Work at your own pace! Every lesson includes a Tarot exercise for you to work on before moving ahead. If you've ever thought you might like to learn the Tarot but didn't know how to get started, this study guide is designed for you!
“Etteilla was one of the people who actually made divination so esoteric,” says Matthews. “He created a deck that incorporated all the things from Court de Gébelin and his book ‘Le Monde Primitif’ [‘The Primitive World’], which suggested an Egyptian origin for the tarot and all sorts of arcane things.” Matthews makes a distinction between the tarot’s abstract interpretations and the straightforward “cartomantic” reading style that thrived during the 16th and 17th centuries, prior to Etteilla.
Now, over a hundred years since the release of the Rider-Waite deck, Tarot cards are available in a practically endless selection of designs. In general, many of these follow the format and style of Rider-Waite, although each adapts the cards to suit their own motif. No longer just the domain of the wealthy and upper class, Tarot is available for anyone who wishes to take the time to learn it.
Jump up ^ Brian Righi. (2008). Ghosts, Apparitions and Poltergeists: An Exploration of the Supernatural through History. Llewellyn Publications. Llewellyn Publications. p. 52. ISBN 978-0-7387-1363-2 "One medium of the 1920s, Mina Crandon, became famous for producing ectoplasm during her sittings. At the height of the séance, she was even able to produce a tiny ectoplasmic hand from her navel, which waved about in the darkness. Her career ended when Harvard biologists were able to examine the tiny hand and found it to be nothing more than a carved piece of animal liver."

In 1917, Edward Clodd analyzed the mediumship of the trance medium Gladys Osborne Leonard and came to the conclusion that Leonard had known her séance sitters before she had held the séances, and could have easily obtained such information by natural means.[116] The British psychiatrist Charles Arthur Mercier wrote in his book Spiritualism and Sir Oliver Lodge (1917) that Oliver Lodge had been duped into believing mediumship by trickery and his spiritualist views were based on assumptions and not scientific evidence.[117]

Jump up ^ Brian Righi. (2008). Ghosts, Apparitions and Poltergeists: An Exploration of the Supernatural through History. Llewellyn Publications. Llewellyn Publications. p. 52. ISBN 978-0-7387-1363-2 "One medium of the 1920s, Mina Crandon, became famous for producing ectoplasm during her sittings. At the height of the séance, she was even able to produce a tiny ectoplasmic hand from her navel, which waved about in the darkness. Her career ended when Harvard biologists were able to examine the tiny hand and found it to be nothing more than a carved piece of animal liver."
Ten mediums—five less expert and five experienced—were injected with a radioactive tracer to capture their brain activity during normal writing and during the practice of psychography, which involves allegedly channeling written communication from the "other side" while in a trance-like state. The subjects were scanned using SPECT (single photon emission computed tomography) to highlight the areas of the brain that are active and inactive during the practice.
Taking a step back, we should be thankful that we live in an unprecedented time in the history of the Church. Literacy is taken for granted, but it was not so in earlier times. Access to books used to be far more limited; in Marsh’s Library in Dublin, for example, books were so rare and expensive that they were chained to desks inside of cages. Compare that to modern times, where we have some of the greatest works of literature and theology available online at our fingertips. How blessed we are! The tradition of the Catholic Church and all the writings of her saints are priceless aids that we need to utilize. Yes, need!

St. John Paul II opens up Fides et Ratio extolling the complementarity of faith and reason; they are “like two wings on which the human spirit rises to the contemplation of truth; and God has placed in the human heart a desire to know the truth—in a word, to know himself—so that, by knowing and loving God, men and women may also come to the fullness of truth about themselves.”[v] Every Catholic isn’t expected to get an advanced degree in theology, but each one of us has to understand what we believe. St. Peter reminds us to “always be prepared to make a defense to any one who calls you to account for the hope that is in you” (1 Peter 3:15).

Modern tarot decks contain 78 cards, broken into two sections, the Major and Minor Arcana (modern terms, used only in relation to tarot used for divinatory purposes). The 56 Minor Arcana, or pips, are broken into four suits of fourteen cards each. These cards are numbered one (Ace) to ten, and there are four “court cards,” similar to a regular playing deck, only with one additional face card. The 22 Major Arcana, or trumps, are numbered 0 through 21, although some people exclude the Fool (0), considering this card to be outside the deck, a sort of “wild card,” rather like his descendant, the Joker.
By the mid-18th century, the mystical applications for cards had spread from Italy to other parts of Europe. In France, writer Antoine Court de Gébelin asserted that the tarot was based on a holy book written by Egyptian priests and brought to Europe by Gypsies from Africa. In reality, tarot cards predated the presence of Gypsies in Europe, who actually came from Asia rather than Africa. Regardless of its inaccuracies, Court de Gébelin’s nine-volume history of the world was highly influential.
You are not just a radio. You can't simply tune yourself in and receive the signal, although this analogy isn't far from the truth. Some spirits in the spirit realm find it easier to initiate and maintain contact than others. Some find it easier to communicate understandably than others. It's like working in a busy store, some of your spirit customers will be easy to deal with, some tricky. You may need to almost counsel a spirit through contact if their energy is weak, if it's a faint connection or if they're experiencing any other difficulty. Again this is all learned through experience.
The trance medium Leonora Piper was investigated by psychical researchers and psychologists in the late 19th and early 20th century. In an experiment to test if Piper's "spirit" controls were purely fictitious the psychologist G. Stanley Hall invented a niece called Bessie Beals and asked Piper's 'control' to get in touch with it. Bessie appeared, answered questions and accepted Hall as her uncle.[98] The psychologist Joseph Jastrow wrote that Piper pretended to be controlled by spirits and fell into simple and logical traps from her comments.[99] Science writer Martin Gardner concluded Piper was a cold reader that would "fish" for information from her séance sitters.[100] The physiologist Ivor Lloyd Tuckett who examined Piper's mediumship in detail wrote it could be explained by "muscle-reading, fishing, guessing, hints obtained in the sitting, knowledge surreptitiously obtained, knowledge acquired in the interval between sittings and lastly, facts already within Mrs. Piper's knowledge."[101]
Here in the physical world, your family and friends aren’t around you 24/7, but when there’s a crisis or emergency, they’re there when you need them. Well, it’s just the same way with your family and friends on the Other-Side. They often know what’s going on in your life and try to let you know they are there for you, whether it’s for love, guidance, hope, or even inspiration. I’m convinced that few people actually realize just how much energy it takes for those who have passed to lower their vibration and make a connection to this physical plane. As a result, it’s not something they’re going to want to be doing all the time. I believe that they have their own learning to do over there and need time to grow and progress, which is why those who have recently passed often need time before they’re ready to connect to the living.

(Everything That Rises Must Converge), Flannery O'Connor put the twisted vision and dark humor of Southern Gothic fiction to spiritual purposes. Though O'Connor, a rural Southerner, knew she would die young of lupus, she remained a faithful Catholic. Indeed, she was determined to undermine the '50s worldview which saw science and logic as steadily leading us to becoming a society based on rationality, consumerism, and progress, which would make God superfluous. Acutely aware of the extremes of religion in the South, she nonetheless preferred that "God-haunted" region to a bland world produced by advertising. She believed the supernatural lay just below the surface of the everyday, requiring the spiritual artist to portray the mundane world with great care and accuracy, however bizarre some of its events and characters might be. O'Connor saw the potential for mysterious grace in any place where the spirit, though twisted, was still alive. Her writing is powerful, at times violent, often hilarious. Sometimes I find it best to read her a little at a time; her unconquerable wit and her deep, abiding spirituality always shine through.

Sometimes I may even come up with a word or saying in their language that I’ve never spoken before. One time I did a reading for a woman who was from Romania. Her mom came through, and she’d never spoken English in her life. When she connected with me, it was all in pictures and symbols. I wasn’t remotely surprised to find out that her mom was an artist and was a visual person. It was as if these pictures and symbols had words attached to them.

Building on Court de Gébelin’s Egyptian connection, Etteilla claimed that tarot cards originated with the legendary Book of Thoth, which supposedly belonged to the Egyptian god of wisdom. According to Etteilla, the book was engraved by Thoth’s priests into gold plates, providing the imagery for the first tarot deck. Drawing on these theories, Etteilla published his own deck in 1789—one of the first designed explicitly as a divination tool and eventually referred to as the Egyptian tarot.
Oracle decks like the Lenormand tend to rely on more direct visual language than traditional tarot cards. “The tarot can often speak in broad, timeless, universal statements about our place in the world,” says Wolf. “The imagery of fortune-telling decks is more illustrational and less archetypal. The images are generally more specific, simpler, and less universal, keeping the conversation more straightforward.”

In 1966 the son of Bishop Pike committed suicide. After his death, Pike contacted the British medium Ena Twigg for a series of séances and she claimed to have communicated with his son. Although Twigg denied formerly knowing anything about Pike and his son, the magician John Booth discovered that Twigg had already known information about the Pike family before the séances. Twigg had belonged to the same denomination of Bishop Pike, he had preached at a cathedral in Kent and she had known information about him and his deceased son from newspapers.[169]

Psychic readings have been used for centuries by the most powerful kings and queens, the Hollywood elite, the rich and famous, and people just like you seeking advice and answers from a higher source. Real psychics can provide valuable insights into a situation that is troubling you, shed light on relationship issues, and give you answers to your burning questions. Online psychic advisors are gifted professionals who prefer the convenience of providing readings via chat, voice or email, and it allows them to help more people than they could see in person.

And at one point you’d hope that the physicist would step down from the pulpit and walk to your brokenhearted spouse there in the pew and tell him that all the photons that ever bounced off your face, all the particles whose paths were interrupted by your smile, by the touch of your hair, hundreds of trillions of particles, have raced off like children, their ways forever changed by you.

In 1970 two psychical researchers investigated the direct-voice medium Leslie Flint and found that all the "spirit" voices in his séance sounded exactly like himself and attributed his mediumship to "second-rate ventriloquism".[170] The medium Arthur Ford died leaving specific instructions that all of his files should be burned. In 1971 after his death, psychical researchers discovered his files but instead of burning them they were examined and discovered to be filled with obituaries, newspaper articles and other information, which enabled Ford to research his séance sitters backgrounds.[171]

While there are a few different forms of mediumship, I work as a mental medium, which means I communicate with spirits through the use of telepathy. Spirits impress my mind and body with thoughts and feelings that come in the form of "clairs." I mentally "hear" (clairaudience), "see" (clairvoyance), "know" (claircognizance) and/or "feel" (clairsentience) messages from spirits. I like to say that I act as the bridge between the spiritual and the physical world, with the intention of healing both worlds.

You make an appointment via telephone or by filling a form on a web page. You will usually be charged by the minute. A genuine, professional medium will get his message over succinctly and clearly. Some unethical practitioners will simply try to wring as much money out of you as possible by keeping you talking. Others, like Psychic Elements, would prefer to build up a rapport by giving you exactly what you want and need in as short as time possible. You won’t get ripped off, and you should be so impressed that you’ll want to repeat the experience when you next need a helping hand from the spiritual realm.

Since the psychic industry is unregulated, it is difficult to report scams and get your money back. It’s really up to the client (you) to determine the validity of a particular medium before plunking down your cash. In addition to visiting the website and screening by telephone, you can ask for referrals (keep in mind these could be the so-called psychic’s friends and relatives) or request the answer to a test question, such as the city where you were born or your maiden name. If the answer doesn’t satisfy you, don’t bother to schedule a reading. There are plenty of other psychics to check out.
In the later half of the 20th century, Western mediumship developed in two different ways. One type involved clairaudience or sensitives who hear spirit, and then relay what they hear to their clients.[29] The other incarnation of non-physical mediumship is a form of channeling in which the channeler goes into a trance, or "leaves their body", allowing a spirit entity to borrow their body, who then speaks through them.[30] When in a trance the medium appears to come under the control of the spirit of a departed soul, sometimes entering into a cataleptic state,[31] although modern channelers may not.[citation needed] Some channelers open the eyes when channeling, and remain able to walk and behave normally. The rhythm and the intonation of the voice may also change completely.